Sony has shown off its new "Whole House" HD video entertainment solution at the Pacific Coast Builders Conference in San Francisco.
Presumably the idea is for Sony to whip in early, at the very beginning of the house construction process, and sell an integrated system that will network the home ready for lots of (Sony) high definition goodness.
Their NHS-1040, NHS-2040, and NHS-3040 systems feature up to 13 zones of HD video distribution, and a Blu-ray disc player.
The top-of-range NHS-3040 rack also incorporates a 7.1 HDMI home theatre with LCD touch-panel remote control, a 400-disc DVD/CD changer with management system, an 80GB music server, radio tuner, HD cable/satellite support, and three auxiliary inputs. Each separate zone has in-wall keypads for controlling it all.
"Integrated home entertainment is becoming a more important factor for new home buyers in the custom and semi-custom market," said Neal Manowitz, director of marketing for Sony Electronics' consumer systems and applications division. "These new systems are ideal for builders and installers because they reduce time spent on procurement and integrating individual components, and offer the consumer a whole house HD solution with all the features of custom installation without the custom price tag."
You probably won't find this kind of technology bundled with your Barratt starter home, but for the higher end market, it makes sense to build the system from the ground up. Depends if you want Sony surrounding you or not.
The systems will be available from the third quarter of 2007. Not surprisingly, prices weren't available, but unless you're a house builder, it's not going to concern you. Let's just say "expensive".
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